Bobby ignored me. “Say good night to your friend here—we’re going for a ride.”
Robin made a creditable effort to intervene. I grabbed his arm. “They’ll put you in Cook County with the muggers and the buggers if you hit him—it’s a police lieutenant. Bobby—Robin Bessinger, Ajax Insurance. Robin—Bobby Mallory, Chicago’s finest.”
In the searchlight Bobby’s red face looked grayish-white; lines I didn’t usually notice sprang into craggy relief. He was coming up on his sixtieth birthday, after all. I’d even been invited to the surprise party his wife was planning for him in early October, but I hadn’t thought of the milestone as meaning he might be getting old. I pushed aside the stab of queasiness the idea of his aging gave me and said more loudly than I’d intended, “Where are we riding to and why, Bobby?”
I could see him wrestle with the desire to grab me and drag me forcibly to the waiting car. Most people don’t know that if you’re not under arrest you don’t have to go off with a policeman just because he tells you to. And most people won’t fight it even if they know it. Even a good cop like Bobby starts taking it for granted; a citizen like me helps him keep his powers in perspective.
“Tell your friend to take a hike.” He jerked his head at Robin.
If I obeyed him on that one, he’d play by the rules. It wasn’t a great compromise, but it was a compromise. I grudgingly asked Robin to leave. He agreed on condition that I call him as soon as the police were done with me, but when he got to the end of the walk, he stood to watch. I was touched.
“Okay, he’s gone. What do you need to talk about?”
Bobby frowned and pressed his lips together. Just a reflex of annoyance. “Night watchman found a body near a construction site around nine-thirty. She had something on her linking her to you.”
I had a sudden image of my aunt, dead drunk, getting hit by a car and left to die. I put a hand on the side of the building to steady myself. “Elena?” I asked foolishly.
“Elena?” Bobby was momentarily blank. “Oh, Tony’s sister. Not unless she shed fifty years and had her skin dyed for the occasion.”
It took me a minute to work out what he meant, A young black woman. Cerise. She wasn’t the only young black woman I know, but I couldn’t imagine any of the others dead near a construction site. “Who was it?”
“We want you to tell us.”
“What did you find that made you connect her with me?”
Bobby pressed his lips together again. He just didn’t want to tell me—old habits die hard. I thought he was about to speak when the door opened behind me and Vinnie the banker erupted into the night.
“This is it, Warshawski. This is the last time you get me up in the middle of the night. Just so you know it, the cops are on their way over. Don’t your friends ever think— shining a light straight into a window where people are sleeping? And talking at the top of their lungs? Or are you trying to lure people inside?”
He had changed out of his pajamas into jeans and a white button shirt. His thick brown hair was combed carefully from his face. He might even have taken the extra time to shampoo and blow-dry it before dialing 911.
“I’m glad you phoned them, Vinnie—they’ll be real happy when they get here. And so will the rest of the block when the squad cars cruise in with those new strobes of theirs painting the nighttime blue.”
Bobby looked at Vinnie. “You call the cops, son?”
The banker stuck his chin out pugnaciously. “Yes, I did. They’ll be here any minute. If you’re her pimp, you’ve got about two minutes to disappear.”
Bobby kept his tone avuncular. “Who you talk to, son—the precinct or the emergency number?”
Vinnie bristled. “I’m not your son. Don’t think you can buy me off too.”
Bobby looked at me, his lips twitching. “You been trying to sell him nickel bags, Vicki?”
He turned back to Vinnie, showing his badge. “I know Miss Warshawski isn’t the easiest neighbor in the world— I’m about to take her off your hands. But I need to know if you called 911 or the precinct so I can cancel the squad cars—I don’t want to waste any more city money tonight pulling patrol officers away from work they ought to be doing because you have a beef with your neighbors.”
Vinnie bunched up his lips, not wanting to back down but knowing he had to. “911,” he muttered, then said more defiantly, “And it’s about time someone took her in.”
Bobby looked toward the street and bellowed, “Furey!”
Michael climbed out of the car and trotted over. Just what I needed to complete the transformation of romance into farce—Michael must have seen me in a clinch with Robin at the door.